Hi all, i'm new here.
I bought p8 and i'm excited but then i started reading the First impressions thread and people don't seem too happy about it.

Did i just make a big mistake by buying it?

Im on macintosh and dont have a superb machine. My computer is kinda old.  

Did you read the required specifications before you bought? I'm not a Mac owner, but if your computer doesn't meet the requirements you're probably not going to be happy with your purchase.

The only problem I'm having is in the face room.  That's been reported.  Looking forward
to it being corrected.

Everything else is working great.

Good luck.  Take it slow.  Have fun!

Oh jeez.  I missed the Mac part there at the end the first time.

Don't load too much stuff into your scenes.  See what your machine can handle, imo. 
Build up.

Good luck.

it's not as bad as poser 5 or 6 were in the early going IMVHO.
it's not as good as poser 7 if one's idea of realism includes ambient occlusion without indirect lighting, or trying to use gather node instead of indirect lighting, or rendering without shadows.

 I think you will enjoy it.....there will be fixes, but enjoy it.  It all depends on how your machine is put together, but don't fret....have a good time....all things can be fixed.  Sharen

 thanks all.

I ordered it today and i'm supposed to receive an email from smith micro confirming my order. I never did. that sucks. Maybe there was an error or something.

Aren't we supposed to get a confirmation email as soon as you purchase online?

Or does it take days/weeks?

Usually, when i buy something online i get a confirmation email as soon as i buy. So i'm worried

Maybe your filter thing blocked it.

Check your account there for the files.

 zigzag, who knows.

But it's not in the Spam folder in my email either. By the way my email is yahoo.com email.

And to buy from Smith micro you don't need to have an account. so you said "check your account" which i don't have.

Been using it for a week now,and so far no real problems.
I am running it on a Quad core,Vista ultimate PC with four
gig of ram.

It has some bad bugs. Every Poser I've ever encountered had them. Smith Micro seems to be working very hard to resolve them. And they're working with the community on this, which is something that e-frontier and Curious Labs didn't seem to do. They even closed their own support forums, which at first seemed like a negative thing but now that they are interacting with the community in forums that they don't control seems good.

I initially had a very negative opinion when Smith Micro bought Poser. In the past they seemed to buy old software and then keep trying to sell the same old thing with no improvements. I've likened Smith Micro to the software equivalent of an elephants' graveyard, where old programs go to die.

I bought it and I'm happy. (Or I would be if my 1TB hard drive hadn't died! Maybe I should blame Poser 8 :))

Oh jeez.  Sorry to hear about your trouble, MyCat.  But I do agree too.  SM impressed
me with this roll out, especially the surprise of the release which made me
feel like I was part of a big event.  Very, very cool, imo.  As well as the ongoing
communications with customers here and elsewhere.

Hmmm.  Sorry to hear that, joster.  You've probably looked at all this already, but
I tried finding something on SM that might be helpful.

support.smithmicro.com/cs/smkb.cfg/php.exe/enduser/std_alp.php

And FWIW, I started out using Poser 7 on a Dell notebook that was already practically
overflowing, had only 2 ram to start with, as well as a so-so card.  And I was able
to render the stuff I wanted as long as I didn't pack too many figures into my scenes.
I've since upgraded, but I'd planned on doing that anyway even before discovering
Poser.

I hope this all works out fast for you.

 I don't have alot of disk space.. Am i missing anything important or necessary( for installation) if i decide not to install the Legacy Content?

I'm going to do custom install and just choose the CURRENT CONTENT which i suppose means the Poser 8 content.

Joster

I haven't had any serious problems with Poser 8. Not like some of the other people in the chat that had problems with it.  I have had a few Bugs "finally" but I'm still happy with Poser 8.  It has given new life to some of my older 3D models.  As long as people report the Bugs to Smith Micro so they fix the issue.

One thing I did notice is that I can't let my computer go into standby or sleep mode because it will crash the program. I think I've been very lucky not to have many of the other issues that others have.

Frederick
Poser By Design

 So how about the sluggishness issue?

Is that just something that i can't do anything about? i have a 1.8Gzh mac.
i guess i probably can't do anything about it..

But well they Advertised the minimum requirements as "Mac G4 700Mhz..." so  ithought a G5 1.8Gzh would not be so bad. But i must say, it's prtty sluggish when moving figures in the pose Window or even just the camera

Try changing to SreeD to see if the reaction improves. If you have an ATI Graphics on your G5, I do not think MAC has had any updates for that in some time, since they switched to a different Graphics. That was an issue in Poser 7 if I recall. If you have one of the later G5, check your Software Updates are not missing anything.

For users looking to make their decision on Forum Posts, I recommend you take it all with a grain of salt. Many issues reported in the Forum are often addressed as soon as the user contacts Support. Not everyone will follow up that it was resolved.

Since Smith Micro offers a 30 Day Money back guarantee, so you can purchase the progam and you can make your own decision based on your system and abilities.

I found Poser 6 and 7 slow on moving around the material room and the main posing window as one cluttered up a scene with figures (and more morphs for figures), props, lights, and added more stuff in the material room. Poser 8 doesn't feel any slower to me, but I do use a newer computer now, so that might be part of why the performance isn't degraded for me.

The bigger the PZ3 gets, the slower it was in the pose and materials rooms. Poser Pro seemed to be a little better in this regaurd.

*"Since Smith Micro offers a 30 Day Money back guarantee..."

You'll get it back from my cold dead fingers.

PS...that isn't a challenge or a death wish, in case anyone is getting ideas.

LMK